The Fire
by ELR
Summary: I just finished watchin’ The Air I Breathe n my angsty muse was crackin’ me upside the head. So.. sorry. Wait. No I’m totally not. I almost cried to bring you guys this. Suffer mwahahahaaa!
1. The Fire

**The Fire**

**Author:** Eden Lee Raven

**Rating:** I'ma say R for character death

**Pairing:** Fuffy

**Note:** I just finished watchin' The Air I Breathe n my angsty muse was crackin' me upside the head. So.. sorry. Wait. No I'm totally not. I almost cried to bring you guys this. Suffer mwahahahaaa!

"_What will it take for you to forgive me?"_

The words bounced around her head, making her eyes flicker in the early morning light. The sun was barely breaking over the horizon, but she didn't care. She never cared.

The house was silent, non of the potentials turned slayers were stirring yet, but she could hear those from patrol last night tip-toeing through the front door. It wasn't so they didn't disturb the sleeping people upstairs. It was so they didn't disturb her.

She stirred sugar into the mug of coffee and picked it up, along with the glass of milk, and walked softly out the backdoor.

"_I already have."_

Her words from so long ago rumbled through her mind, like they did every morning. She took the drinks into the backyard and climbed the small hill at the bottom. There was a graveyard up there, the sunlight just brushing the tops of the grave markers.

She paused at the one for Angel. It had nothing but his name and their final goodbye words on it. 'A Good Man'. Because the man she knew _was_ a good man. No matter how his life ended.

_They were on a rooftop. Her, angel and Faith. Stood in a triangle, her and Faith staring at the gun in his hand._

"_You said you were cookie dough! You said you'd wait for me!" his words were directed at her, the gun all for Faith. And no matter the emotion running through him, his hand was steady. Unwavering._

"_And at the time, I meant it." She didn't take her eyes from his face. Slayers were fast, but if he pulled that trigger… if he pulled that trigger she'd never get to her in time._

"_So what? Now it's all for __**her**__?! She gets cookies and I get what?!" She don't know what to say to him. What he needed to hear to put his gun down. An hour later it was clear there was nothing she __**could**__ say._

_She didn't remember blood being that red._

"Hey." She moved on, hoping to push the memory away for a little while. She put the drinks down and used the cold marble to lower herself to the ground. And then she started talking. About Willow and Kennedy's second child. About scans and due dates. About Xander and his new lady. About everything.

You'd discovered you could always talk to Faith. About everything. About nothing. Her being dead hadn't changed that.

The backdoor squeaked open, but she didn't bother looking to see who it was. It was Xander. It was always Xander. Only he could understand the pain of losing someone you loved deeply, and feel as if you'd never be able to love again.

He didn't say anything, just wrapped a blanket around her and looked at Faiths grave for a little while.

"_It's mystical. Obviously." Willow rubbed her eyes with the pads of her fingers before looking up. "What do you wanna do?"_

"_It's the only piece I have left of her Will." She nodded as if she was expecting that answer. Guess she had to check._

After a few minutes Xander picked up the mug of cool coffee and then slowly poured it onto the grave. It was their morning ritual. She'd talk for a while and he'd come and give Faith her coffee. There was no steam, she's been sat out here a while, like she always was.

"Come on mama." He stood and held his hand out to her, gently pulling her up and tugging the blanket around her belly.

"Xander," his head shot up to look at her in startled wonder. She never spoke when he came to bring her inside. "It's time." He raised an eyebrow and then shoots a wicked grin down to the grave before him.

"Jesus Faith. Can't even let her be on time to give birth to your own daughter?" He rolled his eyes and shook his head, before gently leading her back to the house. To the waiting bag all packet, to the hospital. To the hours of screaming pain that'll all be worth it.

Before the grave was lost to sight she twisted her head and could just make out the words before the door closed.

Faith Marie Lehane

1982 – 2005

Devoted Wife

Greatly Missed Friend

'She Wasn't The Flame…

She Was The Fire'


	2. The Flame

**The Flame**

**Author:** Eden Lee Raven

**Rating:** NC-17

**Pairing:** Fuffy

**Notes:** So apparently 'The Fire' was less of a oneshot an' more of a twoshot lol. Once again with the angst though people, so be warned.

*

She was in a private room, the curtains drawn and her eyes only for the crib next to her bed. She was so tiny. Sparse deep brown hair covering her head and lips that promised to pout, just like Faiths.

She was so beautiful. The final piece of Faith. Marie Anne Lehane.

She felt her eyes drift close as she remembered the night she was conceived.

_She expected the kiss to be heated, passionate. It wasn't. Soft lips moving against hers as tongues came out in a series of fleeting French kisses. She could feel the heat rise between them, but it wasn't the fire that it was most of the time. It was a gentle flame that curled between them, as they gently removed each others clothes._

_When they were naked Faith walked backwards, bringing Buffy with her, and sitting in the middle of the bed. Buffy straddled her lap bringing heated skin flush against heated skin, pressing their molten centers together. A sighed moan rose from them both as they kept kissing, as they moved against each other._

_She'd never had it where the end result wasn't the goal. Where it wasn't about the release, it was about the moments before. About feeling the body of the person you were in love with moving against yours. Of knowing you were the cause of those breathy moans and hitched gasps, and feeling them vibrate through your blood stream._

_She gently leaned forward and pushed Faith back against the bed, never breaking contact with her lips. Even when Faith release a barely there moan, she kept their lips touching through the slow release of air. She felt if she wasn't kissing Faith she'd burn into dust and blow away._

_Slowly Faith wrapped her arms around Buffy and gently rolled them over, running her hand down Buffys side to disappear between her legs._

"_It's not enough." She whispered against Buffys lips a second before she slide deep inside. It made Buffy's neck bow, her back arch and a low moan escape her. But even those few seconds were too long to not be kissing her._

_With their lips pressed together again Buffy ran her hand down between them, and watched in breathless wonder as Faiths eyes rolled up into her head, as she pushed slowly inside her._

_The feel of that burning heat surrounding her fingers caused a shudder to ripple down her spine, a jolt of heat to rock her insides, and then her world blurred at the edges._

She blinked open her eyes, the feel of that heat lingering like the memory it was, wrapping itself around her and squeezing tightly.

She leaned over and gently picked the fussing baby up, cradling her against her chest as she began to feed her. And as she watched her daughter suckle a hand that wasn't hers reached out and softly ran over Maries head.

She looked up startled, because she recognised that hand. The silver ring that adorned the thumb, the small scar the traced the knuckles. And when she did she felt as if all the air was stolen from her lungs.

"Faith.. wha.." the brunette didn't take her eyes from their daughter, a soft smile teasing the corners of her lips.

"Always thought I'd go to hell. I was wrong." Her eyes slid shut at the sound of that voice. Deep and husky and rolling through her body. She thought she'd never hear it again.

"But.. you're dead." And then chocolate brown eyes lifted to meet hers, and even death couldn't extinguish the flame that beat inside them.

"This' just a moment B. Where your life and my afterlife meet. Just for a little while, so I can meet Marie." She nodded. If it was just a few moments she didn't want to fill them with explanations. This would probably be the last time they'd ever meet. "She looks like me." A smile curled Buffys lips as she watched her drink in the sight of her daughter.

"Her eyes are green."

"She had to get somethin' from you." Faith brought her eyes back up to her face and in that one look Buffy knew that this moment was over.

"It's not enough time." Her whisper was a broken thing, because she was about to loose Faith all over again.

"I'm always here B. Just in the other room." She leaned forward then and the kiss she gave was the sweetest she ever had. It told her everything that Faith didn't have enough time to say, everything she couldn't find the words for. "Tell Marie someone loves her."

When the door clicked open she was gone. But Buffy knew that for those few moments she'd been real again. Her perfume still hung in the air, and Buffy's lips still tingled from that last kiss.

A single tear rolled down her cheek as she bid a silent goodbye to the only person to have ever really known her at all.


End file.
